ideal operating system for p2 266 Mhz

[HondaF1]

i hae a P2 266 MHz junk box with 169 mb ram and 4 gb Harddrive. which os is most suitable for this box?

 

[drag]

vector linux

It's based on and compatable with packages from Slackware. It uses minimalist programs were ever possible and is optimized for older computers.

Otherwise I like Debian.

 

[HKSturboKID]

pii 266. I just pick one up the other day. Someone threw it out and I was looking at it and rip the pii processor out. If anyone wants it, let me know. Just pay shipping and its yours.

 

[invalidiuser]

If it was me I would just put win 98 se on it.

 

[zodder]

98 SE or NT 4.0

 

[Phoenix86]

If your going with a MS OS: XP is way better than 98 for driver support, probably has everything built in.. Also if you want to touch the internet with it, I would again go XP (mostly because of SP2). Turn off all the fisher price BS and it's just as snappy as W2K.

Remember, it's slower hardware, no GUI OS is going to run very fast.

 

[groovin]

Originally posted by: drag
vector linux

It's based on and compatable with packages from Slackware. It uses minimalist programs were ever possible and is optimized for older computers.

Otherwise I like Debian.

ah vector. its great... and about the only thing i could get to install on my piece of crap PII laptop.

 

[KoolDrew]

With that machine I would defintely not suggest XP. A linux distro as others stated are good. I have never heard of vector linux but make sure to not use any desktop environments like GNOME or KDE.

 

[Nothinman]

Debian.

 

[HondaF1]

I think i will try the vector linux, thanks for the suggestions. And can someone please comment on the thing about turning off all teh fancy GUI features of Xp and it is just as good as win2k?

 

[HondaF1]

does vector linux support USb linksys wifi adapter?

 

[kmmatney]

Win 2000 is much better than windows XP. It already has the fancy stuff stripped out, and it takes up way less disk space, plus it will have wifi adapter support. I think win98 SE would run fastest on that system, though, and it may have linksys driver

 

[drag]

Originally posted by: HondaF1
does vector linux support USb linksys wifi adapter?

If any Linux distro supports it then Vector can be made to support it, even if it doesn't right off of the bat.

All Linux distros use the Linux kernel, and that is what you deal with when you deal with hardware. It's hard to say, wifi support is spotty at best.

For stuff that Linux supports it works wonderfully, but it's more up to the hardware manufacture then the Linux developers. The Linux developers work hard to get stuff that works, working great, but they can't do it in a vaccum.

It would help if I knew what exacly peice of hardware your talking about, but you can find the answer yourself faster by google'ing it. Do a search for linksys modelnumber usb linux or something like that.

 

[thegimp03]

windows 3.1. jk
do win 98 se.

 

[phantom309]

Win2k will run just fine on that box. It'll probably run faster than win98 because 2k can use RAM more efficiently.

 

[satoshi]

Originally posted by: Nothinman
Debian.

Damn Small Linux, which is based on Debian. It's designed to run from CD, yes, but it makes a very nice distro to put on slower machines. It's optimised to use very little of... well, anything.

 

[VirtualLarry]

I'd say W2K, but I'm slightly biased, I prefer running W2K on all of my boxes, as long as they have enough RAM, and 192MB and up should be good for W2K.

 

[Nothinman]

Damn Small Linux, which is based on Debian. It's designed to run from CD, yes, but it makes a very nice distro to put on slower machines. It's optimised to use very little of... well, anything.

But a P2 266 isn't really "damn small", it won't run KDE very well but Debian has tons of WMs to choose from.

 

[superlie]

Depends on what u want to use it for.
The rule of thumb is to use the OS made during that time.
If you prefer Windows: stick with 98 or NT4.0
Or else: Debian

 

[timswim78]

Originally posted by: drag
vector linux

It's based on and compatable with packages from Slackware. It uses minimalist programs were ever possible and is optimized for older computers.

Otherwise I like Debian.

This Vector Linux looks pretty slick. I am downloading it right now so that I can install it on an old 400 MhZ Celeron with 256MB RAM. Currently, this machine is running Mandrake 10 like a complete dog.